Self‐Regulation and Developmental Psychopathology: Experiential Canalization of Brain and Behavior

Abstract

Abstract We use principles of developmental science and the concept of experiential canalization as a lens through which to view the development of self‐regulation in childhood and risk for the development of psychopathology. Problems with the regulation of emotion, attention, the stress response, and executive functions are characteristic of many psychiatric disorders. Experiential canalization provides a framework within which to examine interactions among processes of self‐regulation across multiple levels of analysis from the genetic to the social and cultural. A focus on self‐regulation illuminates a developmental analysis of risk for psychopathology and also processes of resilience in response to risk. We review the historical understanding of experiential canalization in the scientific literature, examining its initial representation through to its manifestation in current thinking about processes of epigenesis. We then present a comprehensive model of self‐regulation and apply it to research literatures on the development of depression, anxiety, attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, and schizophrenia. In keeping with central concepts in developmental science, we highlight the ways that self‐regulation can best be understood in terms of reciprocal interactions among genetic, physiological, perceptual, cognitive, affective, behavioral and social‐cultural processes and consider the ways in which behavior plays a central organizing role in development with implications for both stability and change. We conclude with an examination of resilience as an instance of the experiential canalization of self‐regulation and resulting considerations for prevention and intervention.